


lay your weary hand on mine

by anotherthief



Series: you're in every story [2]
Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: F/M, Non-Linear Narrative, Post-Series, Post-War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-20
Updated: 2018-08-20
Packaged: 2019-06-29 12:53:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,580
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15729807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anotherthief/pseuds/anotherthief
Summary: When he sees her his eyes crinkle and a slow smile appears. This has disaster written all over it, Margaret thinks, but she gives him a crooked smile in return.Margaret after the war and after Hawkeye tumbles back into her life four years later. A companion piece to "some things were never said."





	lay your weary hand on mine

**Author's Note:**

> There are... a lot of dates. Bear with me.
> 
> And while this can standalone, I would like to advocate for reading "some things were never said" first.

**1954**

After Korea, Margaret gets out of the army but winds up at the Veterans Affairs hospital in Sacramento.

The first year home (if that’s where she is) is hard. Margaret drinks too much and lets too many strays pick her up at the servicemen’s favorite bar. She tells herself that she’s just a sucker for a man in uniform, hasn’t that always been the case?

(In truth, it’s just… easy. Most of them are just passing through. Margaret doesn’t want to be alone, but she doesn’t know how to be with other people either.)

She works, she drinks, and once every two weeks or so she leaves motel rooms when dawn is just beginning to streak across the sky, and cries in her car in the parking lot. It’s not about the strays. Margaret’s a modern woman. She likes sex, likes the company of men. This is a choice she’s making. But everything, _everything_ is hard. Coming back to the states was supposed to feel like victory, but it mostly feels like loss - the loss of friends, of familiarity, of who she was before. (The loss of him, a him who was never hers, another possibility that the war laid claim to.)

Margaret wipes her eyes, drives home, showers, goes to work. She spends her days barking at her underlings and trying to patch back together the men still struggling to put Korea behind them, hoping that if she can help them then maybe she can help herself.

 

\-------

 

**April 9, 1957**

"Well, are you just going to stare at me?"

She rolls her eyes. "So four years ago, or longer, you loved me, and you came here to tell me that. I'm sorry Hawkeye, I'm just still not understanding what you expect me to say or do. It's been four years. We don't even know each other anymore. What should I do?" She arches an eyebrow at him. "Declare my undying love for you and throw myself into your arms?"

The corners of his mouth twitch up. "Yeah, well that would be nice."

She hits his arm. "Good luck with that."

"I'm not. I'm not expecting anything. Hoping maybe. But hoping is very different. And no I mean that would be nice, yeah, but mostly I came here because I'm tired. I'm tired of going through the motions and trying to fold myself back into the person I was in ‘49. And I'm done waiting for my life to fall into place. I missed you. And I wanted to see you, to see if there was a chance you're feeling as lost as I am and maybe just maybe missed me too… and oh, what the hell. I love you. Period. I was hedging my bets earlier but the truth is I loved you then and I love you now and that’s what I came here to say. But of course I'll understand if you just tell me to bug off and go back to Maine."

They sit in silence for the next few minutes. Margaret tries to take all of this in but can’t quite wrap her head around it.

“You don’t love me.” She says, quietly, and when he starts to open his mouth she cuts him off. “Maybe you did then, but you don’t know me now.”

“Why can’t you just believe me.”

She shakes her head. “I’m not the same person I was four years ago.”

“So do you want me to turnaround and head home?”

Margaret narrows her eyes, sizing him up, and wondering if she should have her own head examined for what she’s about to say. "Don't go back to Maine." She gives him a twisty sort of smile where it slides from one corner of her mouth to the other then bites her lower lip. This is going against her better judgment. He grins back at her in response. She groans and leans back, looks at her watch. "Not today anyway. But look I have to get back to my shift. My break ended... too long ago. Meet me over there," she points to the door they came out of earlier, "at 7. There's a terrible little diner a few blocks away where we can have dinner. Food's barely tolerable, but they have good pie."

"And?"

"And," she bobs her head, dragging out the word slightly, "we'll talk. And probably argue a lot if I had to guess. And," she stands, and turns towards him, "we'll go from there." She shrugs and turns on her heel and walks away.

She’s already chiding herself before she reaches the doors of the VA. This is absolute insanity. She’s finally lost her mind. That’s the only explanation for why she’s not sending him back to Maine post-haste. Too much time has passed. He’ll see that, too, soon enough. Margaret has accepted that there are some things she’s just not meant to have.

 

\-------

 

**1955**

In the spring of ‘55, Margaret slowly starts to stitch herself together again. The edges are still jagged in places and some parts may never be entirely mended back together, but she’s drinking less and that’s a start.

She starts seeing a man named Paul. He’s a resident at the hospital but does a rotation through the VA. After a few weeks he asks her out. The fourth time she says yes.

He’s young for her at 27 and missed the draft due to medical school. Most of the guys she’s met at the bars who didn’t serve seem more like boys to her than men. They know nothing of real combat; they’ve never held the hand of a dying friend. To them Korea is the past, history even, less than two years out. Paul is different. He’s serious and determined with broad shoulders, dark eyes, and gentle hands.

Paul’s easy to be with and that scares her. The first time he runs his hand through her hair, cups the back of her neck and pulls her mouth to his, she thinks to herself that she could love him, if she let herself.

\--

Paul’s mother hates Margaret on sight. “She’s 35, Paul, and divorced. You can’t be serious?”

Margaret is supposed to be lying down. They had driven up that morning to his parents’ place in Willow Creek for the July 4th weekend. Now she’s standing in the kitchen, arm frozen in the act of retrieving a glass from the cabinet. Paul and his mother are sitting on the back porch, their voices carrying inside through the screen door.

“Mother. You said you’d give her a chance.” Paul’s voice is low and gravelly, it makes him sound older than his 27 years, one of the first things Margaret liked about him.

“I am, but be reasonable Paul. Don’t you want children? What if she can’t have any?”

That stings. Margaret folds her arms across her chest, the glass she was reaching for forgotten as she stands frozen, incapable of removing herself from this moment.

“Mother, you were 38 when you had Erica.”

The older woman makes a tshing noise. “She was my fourth. It gets easier as you go.”

“And that hair.” His mother clucks. “You’d think a nurse could do a better home dye job.”

“ _Mother.”_ Paul is practically hissing now. Margaret’s never even heard him angry before and something about that breaks her out of her frozen state. She flees the kitchen and makes her way back upstairs to the little guest room on the other side of the house.

Later when Paul comes up to fetch her for dinner, he asks why her eyes are red. She blames it on allergies.

\--

Margaret and Paul don’t break up that July, though the weekend at his parents’ is strained at best. But Paul must have set his mother straight. The older woman never squares off with Margaret directly, but she makes her displeasure known in more subtle ways. It’s more of the same at Thanksgiving and Christmas. The holidays are uncomfortable for Margaret, but they must be too much for quiet, steady Paul. He breaks up with her just after New Year’s.

It ends uncharacteristically for them with a fight, or well, she turns it into a fight. She’s much more comfortable being mad than being hurt.

They’re standing in Margaret’s living room. Paul starts with some vague break up-y things. She can see where this is headed. He’s been pulling away since Christmas. Margaret snaps at him to just get it over with.

Paul is taken aback, not used to this side of her. “You’re angry.” It’s a statement not a question.

In her head, she hears Hawkeye’s voice, _you’re angry when you’re beautiful,_ something she hasn’t heard in years but there it is. She pushes it back down. Paul is waiting for a reply.

Margaret takes a deep breath, trying to steel herself. She puts her hands up. “I’m tired.” Tired of being hurt, tired of being left, tired of goodbyes.

Paul apologizes, he never meant to hurt her and all of that, but it doesn’t really matter. She stops listening. In the end, he’s still walking away. Once again she’s left behind by some man who decided she wasn’t enough, who decided she was more trouble than worth.

She spends one weekend drinking and crying, already missing Paul’s guiding hand on her lower back, missing him reading the paper in her kitchen early in the morning. But then Margaret picks herself up and goes to work on Monday.

 

\-------

 

 **July, 1957**  

They pack up his dad’s house over a long weekend near the end of July. It’s hot, even in Maine, and they leave the doors and windows open, hoping for a cross breeze.

Even after all of their discussions, this still makes Margaret uneasy. Trust doesn’t come easily to her. Hawkeye has assured and reassured her that this is what he wants, there’s nothing left for him in Crabapple Cove, so on and so forth, but doubt has a way of lingering.

On the second day of packing, Margaret’s working in the office, unloading shelves and marking boxes for keep or donate when Hawkeye comes up behind her, places his hands on her shoulders.

“Finished the attic already?”

“Yeah, there wasn’t much left to tell the truth.” His thumbs press into her shoulders, she murmurs her approval, even though she knows she needs to be finishing unloading the shelves, never good at leaving a task in the middle.

Hawkeye kneads her tired shoulder muscles for a couple minutes before running his hands down her arms and pulling her back into him. Margaret rests her head back on his shoulder.

“I hope you’re sure about this,” she sighs more than says, then quietly, “It’s a lot of work if you’re not.”

(She’s not talking about the shelves.)

Gently he squeezes her sides. “I am.”

“Okay.” She leans up, out of his embrace. “Then help or go start on the bedrooms. I have work to do.”

“Yes, sir.” He grins and salutes on his way out the door.

\--

Sometime in the wee hours of the morning, Hawkeye wakes with a start. He jolts and gasps, waking her in the process. When Margaret rolls over, he’s staring up at the ceiling, his eyes wide. She swallows, all too familiar with what he’s experiencing right now. “Hey, hey,” she whispers, and lays a hand on his chest, can feel his heart beating rapidly. He keeps staring at the ceiling, almost caught in a trance. She brushes her fingers over his skin and waits, until finally he turns his head to her. His eyes lose the wide look, but a haunted one remains, one she’s seen before (too many times during the war, at the VA, sometimes in her own mirror).

Margaret wriggles closer until she can lean her forehead to his and brings her hand up to his face, easing her thumb over a few days worth of stubble. Hawkeye closes his eyes at her touch.

“You’re okay.” Her tone is soft but firm.

“I’m really not,” he replies, his voice rough from sleep.

“I’m not either,” she concedes.

Hawkeye hmms at that, then opens his eyes, squinting at her. “We make quite a pair, eh?” He waggles his eyebrows, like that makes it a joke.

The corners of Margaret’s mouth lift, not much of a smile, but something. She’s not awake enough for this to really turn into a conversation so she moves until she’s laying her head on his shoulder, wraps her arm across his middle. She presses a kiss into his neck then tells him to go back to sleep. Hawkeye holds her to him. When his breathing evens out, she’s drifting right behind him.

\--

The next morning they’re finishing up packing the last room in the house, the kitchen. Hawkeye’s been humming as they work. When he holds out his hand, Margaret rolls her eyes but takes it. Hawkeye pulls her to him, her head tucking under his chin and they sway, not really dancing but in the vicinity, his humming as their only accompaniment.

“What are we doing?” She asks, half amused, half confused.

“My parents used to dance in this kitchen,” he murmurs into her hair. She pulls back to get a read on his eyes, tracing them for signs of regret. Hawkeye fought so long to get back to this house, the idea of him being willing to leave it now is still hard for her to believe.

“No second thoughts,” he says, reading her mind and breaking through her thoughts. “Just memories, that’s all.” He hums and they sway a few moments longer, then he spins her out, the spell broken, and they get back to work.

 

\-------

 

**1956**

After she and Paul break up in early January, Margaret dates two guys named David - one a lawyer, the other a used car salesman. Neither of them are really worth her time, but they keep her busy. Margaret thought that would help fill the Paul-shaped hole in her life, but all she really feels is restless. When spring comes, she breaks up with both Davids but doesn’t return to the bar scene.

\-- 

The summer of ‘56 is long and the heat brutal. Margaret spends too many nights lying awake, too hot to sleep. It gives her too much time to think, and too many nights her mind drifts to the 4077th.

Sometimes Margaret dreams, but she’s not sure if they’re dreams or memories. Maybe a bit of both.

 

(She dreams of forty-eight hours straight in meatball surgery, the smell of charred flesh, of Hawkeye and Trapper and the still, of poker games, of Radar and his teddy bear, of explosions and gunfire, of endless days of rain.

Of boys who begged for their mothers.

Of boys who said nothing at all.

Of Father Mulcahy giving Last Rites two and three at a time.)

 

When she wakes with a jolt, she’s drenched, but can’t say if it’s from the heat or the trip back in time.

\--

In early August, she escapes for a week up the coast to a small town just over the state line into Oregon. It’s the first time she’s ever been on vacation alone. In the mornings she walks on the beach, looking for shells. Some days she suns and swims in the ocean. Some days she reads, takes an afternoon nap, and feels gloriously lazy. She goes to little seafood restaurants at night but stays clear of the bars. At 36 years old, Margaret is slowly learning how to be okay with being alone, with being with herself.

 

\-------

 

**September 2, 1957**

When Hawkeye and Margaret arrive at BJ and Peg’s for a Labor Day barbeque, they’ve been in a fight for three days. Margaret doesn’t remember who started it, but she’s going to win, damn it.

When they pull to the curb outside the house, Hawkeye turns off the engine but doesn’t move to get out of the car. “Can we please just be civil until we leave?”

Margaret crosses her arms. Stubbornly, she’d like to say no, but she’s not a child. “Fine.”

\--

Hawkeye acts genuinely happy to be at the barbeque, shooting the shit with Beej, and tossing a baseball for Peg and BJ’s 3 year old son Jack. The little boy doesn’t catch the ball once, but, with Hawkeye’s encouragement, tires his little legs out chasing it around the yard.

Margaret likes BJ’s wife a lot. Peg’s open and quick to laugh. Early in the afternoon, Margaret finds herself sitting alone at the kitchen table with Peg, swapping stories. Peg is relaying 6 year old Erin’s latest school escapades. (Erin gets in fights with boys on the playground who try to shove the girls around and look up their skirts. BJ innocently denies teaching Erin how to land a solid punch.) Margaret thinks she’s doing a pretty good job hiding the tension between her and Hawkeye until Peg finishes her story and asks Margaret point blank, “So what did Hawkeye do this time?”

Margaret gives her a sideways glance, fingers a groove in the wooden table.

Peg gently pushes further. “C’mon. BJ says the two of you fought like cats and dogs over there. I won’t be shocked.”

To her credit, Peg looks entertained. Margaret sighs and shakes her head. “It’s not… yes, we’re… prone to bickering and generally driving each other crazy, but that’s not it.”

Peg’s brows furrow, concern etching across her face, she purses her lips. “Well, you don’t have to tell me, of course, but I’ve been told I’m a good listener.”

Margaret keeps fingering the groove in the table, stalling, deciding. “He just… he wants things he’s not ready for, that I’m not ready for. He doesn’t understand that I need time.”

Peg bobs her head, taking this in for a moment before responding. “But he loves you.”

“That’s what he says.” Margaret inclines her head.

“He moved across the country for you.” Peg raises an eyebrow. “Sounds like love to me.”

Margaret shrugs. “Love or insanity.”

Peg laughs out loud. “Well, from what I know of Hawkeye, I think one always comes with the other.”

It’s Margaret’s turn to laugh. “Fair. But even still… it was just five months ago he showed up on my doorstep. I need time.”

“Then he’ll wait.” Peg smiles and places her hand on Margaret’s right forearm. “The ones we love are always worth waiting for.” Margaret watches Peg’s eyes travel to the window until they land on BJ.

Margaret places her left hand on top of Peg’s. “Thanks.” Peg looks back to Margaret, a warm smile still on her face. “Anytime.”

\--

Later on the drive home, Margaret asks Hawkeye if he had a good time, trying to keep their truce a while longer.

Hawkeye rubs the back of his neck, eyes on the road. “Yeah, it was a nice day, all in all.”

Margaret stares out the window, not brave enough to probe any further, but it turns out she doesn’t have to. Hawkeye clears his throat. “BJ thinks I’m crazy, by the way.”

She glances back at him, his eyes are still on the road. “Well, that’s not exactly news.” She teases, lightly.

Hawkeye scoffs, but she can tell by the set of his mouth that he wants to laugh.

“If I’m crazy, it’s your fault.” He teases back.

Margaret rolls her eyes, even though his stay trained in front of him. “Please. You were crazy long before you met me.”

“No, no. I was… exuberant before I met you. Crazy came after.”

Margaret’s mouth thins, not buying it. “You didn’t even like me at first.”

Hawkeye scoffs again. “You wound me. I was enthralled by you, but you were too busy plotting with Major Ferret Face to throw me out of camp to see it.”

“Oh god, let’s not talk about him.” Margaret shudders.

“I can agree to that.” Hawkeye grins.

They lapse into silence, but it’s less loaded than before, the tension broken. It’s nice, after spending the last three days biting each other’s head off. Margaret doesn’t want it to end, but she can’t help herself and asks, “Why did BJ say you’re crazy?”

Hawkeye drums on the steering wheel and shifts in his seat. “For pushing you.” He cuts his eyes to her then back to the road. “His exact words were something to the effect of ‘it’s a marathon, not a sprint,’ and -” Hawkeye sighs “- that I’m a damn fool if I run you off.”

Margaret bites back a smile. “I always knew BJ was smarter than you. It’s nice to have the confirmation, though.”

Hawkeye makes a face at her and rolls his eyes very dramatically. Margaret can’t help herself and laughs.

“I’m still gonna marry you one day.”

 _“Hawkeye.”_ Margaret groans and swats his arm as they stop at a redlight. They’re nearly back to Sacramento.

“I’m backing off, I’m backing off. I swear. I’m just saying.”

“Okay.”

“Okay, you’ll marry me?” He waggles his eyebrows at her.

Margaret sighs loudly. “O- _kay_ to you backing off.”

Hawkeye just smiles. “So… peacetime officially re-declared?”

He offers her his hand. Margaret takes it, their fingers interlocking. “Yes, now, drive. Green means go.”

“Yes, sir.” He grins. She’d swat him again, but he’s still holding her left hand. Briefly, she wonders if that was his plan all along.

 

\-------

 

**March, 1957**

The winter of ‘57 is an improvement on the one before, if nothing else. Margaret dates a little, but nothing serious. She has resigned herself to being single more often than not. It’s not that she’s not still looking, per se, but romance is lower on her list of priorities than it used to be. Love hurts. If she’s becoming more careful with her heart, she reasons it’s not the worst thing - that _being single_ is not the worst thing.

\--

When she hears the telephone ringing, she makes a mental note to shoot whoever is on the other end of the line. It’s 1 am for crying out loud.

“Hello?”

“You’re in every story.”

Margaret blinks and rubs her eyes with her free hand. She can’t possibly be awake. “What? Who is this?”

“Can you believe that? Because I couldn't not until I was reading them one after the other. Bossing us around and laughing at our scrapes and yelling at me for whatever stupid thing I'd done recently and somehow it just all sort of made sense."

She only catches some of that, the words coming at her too fast when she’s still partially asleep, but the voice is familiar. “... Hawkeye?”

“Yeah, it’s me.”

“What the hell? Are you drunk?”

“Quite possibly, but that’s not the point.”

“By all means please tell me what the point is because you’ve got about a minute before I hang up.”

“Well, see my dad died and I found the letters, the ones I wrote to him during the war.”

 _Oh Hawkeye,_ she thinks and maybe says, but he keeps going.

“So I found them and I started, I don't know entirely why, I mean I do but I don't. Because the letters well, you know, I wrote home more about, about the good days. And I thought. I thought maybe it would help to remember more of the good, and not just try to block it all out all the time. So I started reading them. And there you were. You’re in every story.”

Margaret has absolutely no idea what to do with this drunk confession. “And so you got drunk and called me to tell me you wrote home about me?”

“No, I called you to tell you I was an ass -”

“Well, that I knew.”

“- and I love you.”

 _“Hawkeye,”_ she breathes his name out like a curse, then sighs. “When did your dad die?”

“December.” Hawkeye whispers.

Margaret’s heart breaks for him, but there’s nothing she can do for him tonight. “I’m sorry to hear that. But you’re drunk and should probably go to bed, it’s what 4 a.m. over there?”

“Yeah, something like that.”

“Go to bed.” Her voice is soft, but stern. They say goodnight; she hangs up first.

Afterwards Margaret lies awake for a long time, turning over and over what just happened. She would be lying if she said it didn’t tug at her heart, his pain and his revelations. But she’s spent enough time with emotional drunks to know better than to put stock into things he might not even remember in the morning.

But even still, she lies awake and lets her mind wander. She remembers his easy smile and how it made her heart ache to see the war steal it away little by little. Margaret would have given anything to give it back, but trying to fix broken boys has always left her sad and alone.

 _No_ , she tells herself, _he won’t even remember calling me tomorrow._

(It would hurt too much, to let herself think otherwise. Because the rational part of her brain knows better than to hope she’ll ever hear from him again.

He was never hers - is what she tells herself.

It’s what she needs to believe.)

 

\-------

 

**December, 1957**

They have a knockdown blow out one Saturday in early December. Hawkeye has been in a mood for weeks, complaining about the hospital, the weather, the traffic, the palm trees, holiday music - you name it.

When he comes in from fetching the paper and starts in on the paper boy’s bad aim, Margaret finally snaps. “He’s a twelve year old kid! Cut him some slack.”

“I don’t think it’s expecting that much to not have to dig the paper out of the bushes every day.” Hawkeye growls.

Margaret tries to keep her tone even, barely managing it. “Well, how many newspapers have you thrown lately? I’m sure it’s harder than it looks.”

“Well, if it’s too hard for him then he needs to find another job.”

“Hawkeye, do you even hear yourself right now?!,” Margaret seethes and stands up from where she was sitting on the couch. “You have been in this mood for weeks and I’m sick of it. That paper boy isn’t the problem, _you_ are. First it was the hospital, then holiday music on the radio, California drivers -”

“- turn signals are there for a reason, and California drivers need to catch up to the rest of the country!”

“Just go back to Maine!,” she barks. “If you hate it so much here, just go! I told you this was crazy. I told you that this couldn’t work. If you’re going to go just go! Everyone else does. You might as well get it over with!” The words fly out of her mouth leaving her breathless, her heart racing, cheeks hot.

Hawkeye just stands there, stunned. He opens his mouth to speak, but Margaret cuts him off. “I’m going to be late for work.” She snatches up her keys and heads out the door, grateful that she had picked up a shift at the hospital on the surgical floor. She doesn’t want to think, doesn’t want to feel, right now and if she’s focused on surgery, she won’t have to.

\--

That night, Hawkeye finds Margaret sitting on the swing on her back porch, staring out at the horizon even though sunset has come and gone.

“Margaret, what are you doing out here?”

Margaret blinks, knowing she needs to respond, but no words come. She looks at him then out at the yard again. He stands there for a minute then disappears into the house. When he comes back, he has a blanket. He sits down beside her and the swing creaks, shifting with the addition of his weight. Hawkeye throws the blanket over their legs.

“He was young.” Her voice sounds hoarse. She didn’t realize until now she was crying. Hawkeye slips his arm around her waist and pulls her in until she leans her head over on his shoulder.

“I’m sorry.” Hawkeye’s voice is soft, a beat passes then he continues, “And I’m sorry about this morning.” He sighs. “I just didn’t realize how hard it would be. I know you told me, but I had - I had almost forgotten what homesickness feels like. But I didn’t - I’m not going anywhere. I’m here. I’m sorry. I’m here.” He presses a kiss in her hair. Margaret slips a hand into his free one and squeezes, hoping he can understand it’s the _I’m sorry too_ that she can’t get out in words right now.

They sit for almost an hour, the only sound coming from the creaking of the swing. If it were summer there would be crickets chirping, but it’s early December and the world is quiet.

\-- 

Christmas Day is on a Wednesday. It’s always weird when holidays fall in the middle of the week. Hawkeye’s working Monday and Tuesday at the hospital. The VA wants her Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, but they both manage to be off Wednesday. They don’t really do anything but lay around listening to records and stringing popcorn strands to add to the tree. Hawkeye eats more than he strings, and they bicker when she points that out. (Hawkeye swears it’s at least 60/40 going on the string, Margaret says it’s more like 70/30 going into his mouth. “And you love me anyway,” Hawkeye tells her. Margaret shakes her head. “God only knows why.”) It’s nice, though.

 

\-------

 

**April 10, 1957**

The morning after Hawkeye turns up in Sacramento, Margaret wakes up and smells breakfast. She pulls her robe on and runs her fingers through her hair before padding down the hallway from her bedroom through the living room, passing the blankets haphazardly piled on the couch, to the kitchen. There she stops in the doorway, leans into the frame. Hawkeye is standing with his back to her, frying bacon in an iron skillet on her stove. His pajamas are gray with pin stripes, his feet bare on the linoleum floor. He hums as he cooks. It’s not a tune Margaret recognizes. She’s not even sure it’s really a song at all; it might be just a string of notes meant to stave off the silence. Hawkeye has never been very good at quiet.

Margaret watches for a couple of minutes, drinking in the sight of him in her kitchen. It still feels a bit like a dream or something out of a dime store romance novel. She’s not the woman who men drive across the country to see, to declare their love for. No, men only chase her to leave her later. If Hawkeye meant everything he said yesterday, this is a first.

Hawkeye takes up the bacon, using a fork to lift the pieces out of the skillet and onto a waiting plate on the countertop. He flips off the eye and turns around. When he sees her his eyes crinkle and a slow smile appears. _This has disaster written all over it_ , Margaret thinks, but she gives him a crooked smile in return.

 

\-------

 

**March, 1958**

It’s just a random Sunday. Margaret is sitting on the couch folding laundry when Hawkeye comes in from outside. He tosses the rolled up paper on the coffee table and stops by the couch, picks up a towel, folding it neatly and then another, and adds them to her stack.

(It’s not really much of anything. Later, Margaret couldn’t tell you why that was the moment she knew he meant it when he said he wasn’t going anywhere, but it was.)

She watches him fold a pair of jeans. “Okay.”

“Okay, what?”

She picks up a hand towel, folding it over once, then again. “Okay, I’ll marry you.”

For a second, she thinks Hawkeye might actually be stunned speechless, but she needn’t have doubted he’d have a witty retort. “Were you that impressed with my folding skills?”

“No, just -” Margaret sputters, “- shut up, or I’ll take it back.”

When she looks up, he’s grinning. “Yes, sir.”

Hawkeye takes the stack of towels and starts to walk them down the hall toward the bathroom, grinning all the while. Margaret seriously considers throwing something at him.

 

\-------

 

**epilogue**

The wedding is a small affair in BJ and Peg’s backyard on a pretty spring Saturday in April. Hawkeye and Margaret would have been content to go to the courthouse, but Peg insisted. Erin is the flower girl and Jack is the ring bearer. Peg’s friend Evelyn makes the cake. BJ walks her down the aisle, but offers to help her make a run for it first, which earns him a sharp elbow in the side from Peg. The ceremony is short. (“Lest either of them changed their minds in the middle,” BJ tells the neighbors after it’s over, earning him another elbow from Peg who smiles sweetly at the neighbors’ bewildered looks and offers them a glass of punch.)

What Margaret remembers most about the day isn’t the cake or her dress, it’s this moment right here: dancing in the grass after their few guests have dispersed, and BJ and Peg have gone into the house to tuck the kids into bed. Margaret’s head is on Hawkeye’s shoulder, his hands are at the small of her back, and he’s humming along to the music.

Margaret learned long ago that she can’t predict what the future will hold, but in this moment, she feels like maybe, if they’re very lucky, they’ll be dancing for a long time to come.

(And probably bickering.

She can work with that.)

**Author's Note:**

> Once again I am indebted to Katie, thanks for everything.
> 
> Title comes from the Jon Bryant song "Wilderness."


End file.
